
E 312 

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Copy 1 '^ 

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OF 

Hon. John S/Wise. 

DF VIRGINIA; - 

Delivei[ed at the Annual Ba^et of the Michig/n Club 

AT 

DETROIT, MICHIGAN, 
IT- E B le TJ ^A, I^ Y 22i3, 1887, 

RESPONSIVE TO THE SENTIMENT 

GEORGE WASHINGTON, THE VIRGINIAN, 



NRW YORK: 

MARTIN B. BROWN, PRINTER AND STATIONER, 

Nos. 49 AND 51 Park Place' 

1887. 



S F» K E^ C tl 



Hon. John S. Wise, 



DF IZIR&INIA, 



Delivei|ed at the Annual Bapet of the Michigan Club 



DETROIT, MICHIGAN, 



IF" E :B S, TJ J^ E, "Y" 22i3, 1887. 



RESPONSIVE TO THE SENTIMENT 



GEORGE WASHINGTON, THE VIRGINIAN, 



NEW YORK: 

MARTIN B. HROWN, PRINTER AND STATIONER, 

NoK. 4i» AND 51 Park Place. 

i8sr. 



SPEECH 



Hon. JOHN S. WISE, 



After the conclusion of Mr. Boutelle's speech, Mr. Wise 
was introduced to the assemblage by Senator Palmer, in a few 
appropriate remarks, and proceeded : — 

Mr. Chairman and fellow-citizens : It was but yesterday 
that I passed through Williamsburg, the ancient, faded 
capital of the Old Dominion — the historic spot whence 
Washington set forth one hundred and thirty j^ears ago, in 
the historic Braddock campaign. To-day, resiDonsive to your 
invitation, I greet you, fellow-citizens of Michigan, to speak 
to the sentiment, " George Washington, the Virginian." 

Could we have met him on this ground when he lived, it 
would have been as fellow-citizens of one commonwealth ; for, 
as George Washington was Virginia's best and noblest gift 
to liberty, your splendid northwest territory was her second 
and scarce less noble tribute to perpetual union. [Applause]. 
Could we meet here to-night, that great spirit oi George 
Washington, I doubt nt)t that his proudest smile would 
wreathe at the thought that through all the toils and troubles 
of the century that has passed, we still meet upon this soil as 
fellow-citizens and brethren of a common country. [Ap- 
plause.] George Washington lived in a single revolu- 
ti(ni, great in its inception, great in its progress, wonderful in 



its results. You and I have lived in a tliousaud revolutions — 
revolutions . social, })olitical, economic ; revolutions in 
domestic economy, revolutions in the whole theory of heat, 
light and electricity ; revolutions in law, revolutions in medi- 
cine, revolutions in all the sciences, revolutions in constitu- 
tional construction, revolutions in citizenship, revolutions in 
modes of thought, revolutions in modes of travel, revolutions 
in a thousand things which he ne'er dreamed of in his phil- 
osophy. Tliink Avhat we have seen — not only the struggle of 
men with each other, not only the struggles over constitu- 
tional ideas and theories of government, not only the strug- 
gles and revolutions Avhich Ave have witnessed at the point of 
the bayonet, but pause for an instant to consider what we 
have witnessed in our day and generation. In the household 
the loom has driven away the spinning jenny, the sewing- 
machine has banished the needle ; upon the farm, the inven- 
tions and discoveries of labor-saving machiner}^ have destroyed 
the last vestige of old-time methods. In trade and commerce, 
the application of steam, telegraphy, the telephone, steno- 
graphy and what not, have revolutionized their every 
bearing. The learned professions are apace with all other 
departments in their advancement — in Medicine : vaccination, 
anaesthetics, stiptics, pain destroyers, have upset ever}^ ancient 
theory and practice of physician and surgeon. 

Even the staid profession of Law, whose devotees de- 
light to boast that its principles are eternal, has had its revo- 
lutions also. Not only have we witnessed the reversal of 
many of the old dicta of constitutional construction, but even 
in its ordinary civil administration we have beheld many rev- 
olutions. As such, for example, I class the doctrine of 
mechanics' liens and the later rulings by which the claim of 
the latest workman upon a railroad is placed higher than the 
oldest recorded lien upon its franchises. 

Heat, light and electricity, the mysteries which puzzled 
scientists and tilled the vulgar herd with superstitious awe in 



the days of George WHsliiiigton, liave been grappled by tlie 
minds of our day and generation, tamed in their wildness, 
harnessed to our daily and hourly use, and are the familiar 
playthings of our children. 

Peace and War alike have succumbed in their methods to 
the power of human thought. Upon the land and on the sea 
those offensive and defensive weapons which in the days of 
Washington were the most terrible and impregnable, would, 
if now used by any civilized nation of the earth, be looked 
upon as little better than idiotic and suicidal. 

About us and around us, everything, everjwhere is 

NEW AND REVOLUTIONARY. 

All these reflections passed across my mind as I traveled 
here. 

A hundred years ago ! 

Do you recall what this country was when George Wash- 
ington was alive ? 

Coming from his home I crossed, with the speed of 
lightning, the magnificent Shenandoah valleys, in Avhicli his 
troops were Avont to linger in their weary marches. Over the 
towering Blue Ridge and Alleghanies with a bound, those 
frowning obstacles on which he toiled and suffered through 
half a year. Asleep, we sped across the mighty Ohio which 
to him Avas the further boundary of civilization and the 
mighty barrier against tlie incursion of the savage. W^ith 
the swiftness and steadiness of eagles' wings we sped onward 
through those great centres of population in Ohio, which in 
his day were howling wilderness. And, still ouAvard, far, 
far, beyond all that, is Detroit. [Laughter.] Ah I my friends, 
it was no laughing matter to George Washington. Your 
noble city, Avitli its towers and spires, with its peerless river, 
with its emulous commerce and indomitable energy, was yet 
unheard of. Its very site was onh' known as the mvsterious, 



frightful spot, whence concocted Frencli and Indian massacre- 
poured forth upon the Eastern settlements. 

Yet how wonderful Avas the man whose birth we eelebi'ate f 

Notwithstanding all these surprising revolutions in the 
methods of men, notwithstanding these phenomenal material 
developments, notwithstanding the teeming millions that 
people that Nation which, when he made it, was in great part 
a wilderness, notwithstanding the many great events and 
great men that have come after him, there stands the name 
and fame of Washington, calm, serene, towering, still first in 
war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrAinen, 

Like Saul among the tribes, "from his shoulders and 
upwards tallest among all the people," greater to-day, more 
beloved to-day, his maxims of government more cherished 
to-day, than Avhen he died — almost a century agone. 

If Washington were here to-night what a tale we 
could tell him on his birth-day, of the century which has 
nearly passed since he died, and left that great farewell 
address, the most precious heritage of Americans. [Applause.] 

Look about you. Look around yon. Think of the revo- 
lutions we have witnessed. Of what great things shall we 
speak ? Touching what great issues shall we commune t 
Shall it be of our second war with Britain ? No ; the story is 
old and half foro-otten. Shall it be of our actiuisition of a great 
domain from France, out of which clusters of t-ommonwealtlis 
have sprung ? No ; life is too short for that. Shall it be of 
the Alamo or of Cerro Gordo, of Monterey, or Buena Vista? 
No. Shall it be of a bitter strife and agony betAveen men 
who were and still are l)rethren ? No ; my heart still sickens 
at the story, and not even the immortal valor of the combat- 
ants can lend an interest to the hideous tale. Others have 
told you eloquently and will tell you of the past, I prefer to 
live and act and speak in the present and of the future. 

The revolutions in this country in thought and action are 



too great, too fast, too tremendous for us to be going back a 
(quarter of a century and talking of wliat happened then. 

The issues of twenty-five years ago are too dead, and the 
issues of to-da}' too living, to justify any man, however intel- 
lectual or eloquent, in discussing the former or neglecting the 
latter when he comes before the people. 

No matter Avhere he stood, no matter wliat he thought, 
no matter what he did in that period of ancient history, 
the American intellect and American energies demand fresh 
pabulum to-day. So swift is the current, so strong the rush, 
so dead the past with all its passions, so live the present with 
all its liopes and possibilities. 

Jefi'erson Davis talking secession to-da}^ excites no more 
enthusiasm and arouses no more animosity than an Italian 
organ-grinder playing Dixie. [Prolonged laughter and 
cheers. I The antiquated Avrathy citizen of the North avIio 
calls for an indignation meeting to put him down, is greeted 
only with derisive laughter by the busy millions who, having 
long since settled that transaction, are pressing forward to 
something else. 

A man, lie he of the North or South, who expects to keep liis 

HEAD ABOVE THE TIDE 

of public sentiment and keep abreast with thought and action 
in the great progressive Nation in which we live, must find 
something better and newer to think and talk about than the 
events which took place twenty-five years ago or " Befo' de 
wall." [Laughter and applause.] 

Why, my fellow-citizens, the time has come, with its 
wonderful revolution, Avhen the little boys of tlie South are 
taught from the histor}', and the men of tlie Soiitli are learn- 
ing that Abraham Lincoln in his da}' and generation was the 
greatest sage and statesman of his century. [Applause.] 
And I will tell you another thing that is happening every 
dav, North and South. The man who shed his blood for the 



8 

Union or Confederacy may try to stem the tide without avail. 
The little boys of the North and South who read the history 
of that war are not thinking of it, or feeling about it as we 
did. You may teach them that one side was right and the 
other was wrong ; that to love one liero and despise another 
is a matter of patriotic duty. So be it ; it is well. History 
may put it down that one was patriot the other rebel. Their 
teaching may be ever so orthodox, and their little hearts 
ever so loyal, but, God be praised, the sting of our bitter- 
ness in days gone by cannot be taught them ; and while their 
young blood shall tingle at the glorious deeds of Grant or 
Logan, it is too pure, too fresh, too American not to thrill 
and pulsate now and then with true pride that American 
valor can claim the name of Stonewall Jackson. [Prolonged 
applaiise and cheers.] 

The time will come, my fellow-citizens — and no shriek of 
old-time animosity can keep it back — the time is not far dis- 
tant, Avhen the people of the United States will remember 
nothing of the causes of that strife, nothing of the differences 
which once divided us, because the great issues which were 
involved are fixed forever, and the South to-day, let me tell 
you, could not be driven out of the Union if you were to try. 
[Prolonged applause.] 

As for the Southern States, parti cularl\' Virginia, I assert 
most confidently tliat no greater revolution has ever been 
witnessed or ever will be than in the feeling which prevails 
there, not only in the sentiment of Union, but in the growing 
feeling that the Republican party is the true liope of the 
people of the South. [Applause.] Would any gentleman 
ask me why? I will answer. 

The causes which led originally to the formation of the 
Republican party naturally antagonized the slave-holder, and 
even long after slavery was abolished, traces of that feeling 
of bitterness remained in the Southern people. The fact that 
the Republican party prosecuted the war to successful con- 



9 

elusion, and that it directed the measures of reconstruction, 
while the Democracy pretended some sort of peculiar guard- 
ianship of, or kindly interest in the South, tended to per- 
petuate the antagonism. 

But, of late, with a fading of all war animosities and after a 
trial both of the friendship and the principles of Democracy, 
the South has at last come to realize that through all these 
years it has deluded itself in supposing that it had more to 
expect from Democracy than Republicanism. 

The Democracy, in power, as out of power, has demonstrated 
that it has no cohesive principle, and no single purpose 
towards which all its members may look for any unity of action. 
What it shall do, or how it shall be done, is always a prob- 
lem, dependent upon which of its warring factions shall be in 
the ascendant ; disappointment, disgust, and a purpose to 
abandon it, are the legitimate results of its lack of unity, and 
thousands of people in the South who remember the wisdom, 
the unity, the prosperity of the administration of the Govern- 
ment under Republican rule, are turning towards it, because 
they feel and know that the Republican party, from the hour 
of its birth until now, has known what it was for and was not 
afraid to tell. [Applause.] Because the Republican prin- 
ciples are such that he who runs may read and the wayfaring 
man, though a fool, can understand. [Great applause.] 

Because they remember that the Republican party, born 
in a great national throe, at its birth boldy announced its 
principles, no matter how obnoxious they might have been at 
the time to those who were opposed to it ; and when those 
principles were announced never stopped until they were 
carried to their legitimate conclusion. Because they are now 
realizing that it, for twenty-five years, has been the pioneer in 
thought, in every movement that has culminated in the great 
prosperity of this land to-day ; because it is a party now of 
which it can be said it never was afraid of a great idea 
because it was new, and it 



10 

NEYER WAS AFEAID 

to take hold of a new idea because the task of enforcing it was 
great. [A.pplanse. | Recognizing the existence of that feel- 
ing I have, myself, no doubt that in the South is the hope of 
the future growth of the Republican party. Why ? It sounds 
like a paradox to announce it here, and yet it is true. The 
people of the South never were a negative or an obstructive 
people. They are fast realizing the patent fact that the Dem- 
ocratic party of this country, unless it is stopping somebody 
or denying something, is nothing at alL [Applause and 
laughter.] 

The people of the South have undergone a revolution that 
you can little understand here. But yesterday, the great 
American Desert in the West was believed to be beyond the 
power of reclamation, yet, to-day, owing to altered climatic 
influences, it may be seen burdened under a noble 
harvest, the most productive section of our land ; and so I 
say to you in all sincerity that the alkali desert of slavery 
that lay in the Southern land, and knew only the hot breath of 
sectional passion, is to-day beginning to bloom with the fruit 
of industry and labor. Believe me, friends and fellow-citi- 
zens of Michigan, there is the ground for your missionary 
work. You little realize the fact that South Carolina, once 
solely given up to political abstractions, and deeming work 
derogatory to her gentility — South Carolina, that was 
given over thirty years ago to slavery and dreaming — to-day 
is entering the markets of the world with cotton products 
and battling for the market of Shanghai, sending out millions 
of yards of her cotton cloth each month. In Alabama, a city 
has sprung up almost with the suddenness of magic under 
the influence of the development of her iron and her coal. 
George Washington once said, in the darkest days of the 
revolution, " Give me a little band of men in the mountains 
of West Augusta, and there I will resist the combined powers 
of all our enemies." To-day the mountain side has been 



11 

tapped and coal and iron and minerals of all kinds are 
poured out to the few men who have gathered in those 
mountains of West Augusta. The wealth that Old Virginia 
lost is coming back to her in her newly developed industries. 
A new South is dawning. A new population is growing- up 
tliere. Old ideas and old methods are yieldiug to a new born 
interest in material thrift. Slavery is almost forgotten. The 
status of the freed and enfranchised slaves is more firmly estab- 
lished and more fully recognized every year. Men have found 
other subjects than secession and States' rights, slavery, and 
race prejudices, to excite and interest them. Mines, quarries, 
mills, building of railroads, industrial enterprises of all kinds, are 
occupying their thoughts and kindling tlieir hopes anew. 
The Soutli^ proportion of the railroads huilt in this country 
within the last three years is truly surprising. I 
wish the time at my disposal permitted me to give you the 
statistical information on these heads. Education of the masses, 
business enterprise, trade, emulation of the busy, l)ustling, pros- 
perous North — these are the things to which the Soutli of to-day 
is bending its energies in earnest. The slave mart has been con- 
verted into the school-house ; the iron, which was once known 
only as chain and manacle to enforce the awful thraldom of 
slavery, is now being wrought into machinery and railroads to 
the uses and for the transportation of the products of a free and 
industrious community. We are fast approaching the blessed 
period when the South will be without any " peculiar institu- 
tions," and as national as the North. The influences of. 
all this new state of affairs is eminently conservative. When 
men begin to struggle for business prosperity, when they become 
interested in the protection and development of wealth, they lose 
the animosities and sectionalism of those who lack these refining 
and civilizing influences ; they yield less to passion and to local 
prejudice, and seek, more and more, calmly, interestedly, for 
those political alliances which their judgment and self-interest 
assure them are most to their pecuniary advantage. 



12 

With a deepening and increasing feeling of tins sort, 
the people of those sections of which I speak have tried 
the Democratic party and found that it is not what it 
promised. Thej are nearly or quite ready to leave it and 
seek a real party instead of a snare and a delusion. [Ap- 
plause.] Do you ask me why they turn to the Republican 
party ? I will tell you why. If the Republican party had 
been the power in which they put their trust, they would 
have known, by its past boldness in pledge and faithfulness 
in performance, that it had always been an honest party in 
what it professed ; and, when it came into power, they would 
have expected, as certainly as they know that there are one 
hundred cents iu a gold dollar, that the Republican party 
would 

CARRY OUT ITS PLATFORM, 

good, bad, or indifferent. If the Republican party, by the 
aid of the Solid South, had won its victory in 1884, don't 3^ou 
know that when it had told the Solid South that it would give 
education through the means of the Blair bill, it would have 
given it instead of burying it in a committee '? [Applause.] 
Don't you know, my fellow-citizens, that if the Republican 
party had won a victory by the aid of the Solid South upon 
the solemn promise of the repeal of the internal revenue 
laws, it would have carried out the promise as soon as it w^as 
in power ? Yet the Democratic party, although solemnly 
pledged all through the South to repeal the internal revenue 
laws — although it has been in control of the Executive and 
the branch of Congress in which all revenue measures must 
originate, for two years, has never yet been able to make its 
two wings flap togetlier when the question was up, so as to 
redeem its reiterated and violently uttered pledges. [Ap- 
plause.] Don't you know, my fellow-citizens, that if the Re- 
publican part}^ had been elevated to power upon a promise 
to distribute the surplus in the Treasury, in this lapse of 



13 

time that surplus would have been distributed instead of 
having Sam Eandall at one end of the bag and Morrison at 
the other pulling the thing in two and spilling it all ? [Ap- 
plause and laughter.] Don't you know that if the Republican 
party, abandoning its past history, had gained power by an 
appeal to race prejudice — if it had gone through the South 
saying " We are the white men's party " — it never woiild have 
been guilty of the duplicity of appointing Matthews the first 
thing it did ? [Applause.] Don't you know that if the Re- 
publican party had been elected to power upon a solemn 
pledge to respect the Civil Service law, its Executive would 
not have been guilty of the base hypocrisy of pretending to 
respect and observe that law in New York, while in the neigh- 
boring State of Virginia he sleAV and spared not every Repub- 
lican in the State, no matter how faithful, no matter how long 
his service, merely to gratify an almost personal malice of 
Bourbonism against Virginia's Republican senator and 
representatives ? Yes, fellow-citizens, you do know these 
things and many others I might mention if time permitted. 
You know that no pledge of the now dominant party, that 
was given before it came into power, has been redeemed. 
You and thousands of those who were its supporters know 
and see that its whole record is one of broken and unre- 
deemed pledges, of utter inability to control and manage the 
affairs of government correctl}'^, and of absurd and shallow 
false pretence to virtues and non-partisancy to which it can 
lay no honest claim. 

Fellow-citizens, this so-called Democracy has given us the 
shibboleth of " Jeffersonian simplicity." There was a secretive, 
furtive vein in Thomas Jefferson that would have made it quite 
correct, and very much alike in sound, to speak of " Jeifersoniau 
duplicity." [Applause and laughter.] The Republicans have 
taken the chart of their principles from Washington rather than 
from Jefferson. If simplicity was the leading characteristic 
of Jefferson, sterling honesty was the crowning virtue of 



14 

Georo;e Wasliiiiorton. So truly does the farewell address of 
Washington represent the principles of Republicanism, that we 
miglit enter the next campaign with no other platform and no 
other sign than the ])ictnre of Washington and his farewell 
address. Thej would l)e no more, no less, than the platform of 
the great Republican party of to-day. [Applause.] In the days 
of George Washington there was a hatchet. [Laughter.] From 
some recent occurrences I rather think we have inherited that 
hatchet also. 

We have heard much of this Jeffersonian simplicity. I suppose 
we never will have such another example of it as the message 
which the Democratic Executive sent in assigning reasons for the 
appointment of JVIr. Matthews. Simple indeed must have been 
the Jeffersonian who would give to a Republican Senate such 
reasons. Quick and 

HOT WAS THE BLOW 

that came back from the hatchet of George Washington 
when the answer to those reasons was returned to the simple 
Jeffersonian. [Applause.] 

We have other maxims from this part}' which we will try 
to recall. In the earl}' stages of the present administration 
we had the expression " innocuous desuetude," and now the 
answering echo to that sentiment over in Indiana is " noxious 
Turpi(e)tude." [Laughter.] Now, my fellow-citizens, these 
great disappointments from a party that has promised every- 
thing and performed nothing, the memory of the splendid 
prosperity which attended the rule of the Republican party of 
this country, a general feeling that Democracy has been 
weighed in the balance and found wanting, all these are hav- 
ing their effect, all are telling their tale. A brigbteuing, 
deepening sense of patriotism is pervading this land from 
one end of it to the other, thank God. and love for the Nation 
that no man can put down is becoming universal throughout 
the country. 



15 

There are great and salient points of difference between 
the Republican and the Democratic party, points which cannot 
be forgotten, points touching the election laws which I think 
best not to discuss. I say to you frankW, however, that, 
although I have fought against those outrages and abuses, 
the temper and spirit of the South to-day is more catholic 
more reasonable, more disposed than ever before to correct 
these wrongs and to insist upon an honest count and return, as 
a matter of common honesty which they owe themselves, and. 
to admit that the Republican party of this country is just 
and reasonable in its firm demand that such shall be the 
case. Believing such to be the fact, I am disposed to let the 
evil correct itself, as it must, in time, in every brave and 
honest community, and to api:)eal to you, for God's sake, to let 
no bitterness stop the tide which is steadily and surely ris- 
ing. [Great cheers.] Why should not the, land which gave 
birth to Washington rally under the banner which he handed 
to this great party ? It will. It has. You heard the slogan 
in the last election. We snatched seven of the ten Congress- 
men from the hands of Bourbonism, and the next time we will 
try to make it unanimous. [Applause.] Pursue a broad and 
liberal policy toward this people, and this nation's wealth will 
not have to be poured out to save New York to our party in 
every national election. [Cheers.] Pursue a broad and catholic 
spirit. Stand by the pledges that are made by the Republican 
party upon all the leading issues of tariff, internal revenue and 
education, and in the next election West Virginia, Virginia, 
North Carolina, Tennessee and Indiana will fall into line. 
[Loud cheers.] I care not who it is. All that we ask is that a 

REPUBLICAN TRIED AND TRUE 

be put in charge of the standard, I care not whether it be 
Blaine of Maine [tremendous cheers] or Sherman of Ohio 
[pointing to. their portraits on the wall]. Either is good 
enough for the republicans of Virginia. 



16 

I read not long since an account of the marriage of George 
Washington, and it reminded me of the present. 

The writer described a beautiful wedding, at which the 
charming bride was led from the chancel to a stately chariot, 
drawn by thoroughbreds. She and the fair coterie of her 
bridesmaids were placed Avithin the equipage, attended by 
George AVashington and a gallant company of gentlemen who 
formed a mounted escort. Our fancies can easily picture 
that interesting scene of long ago — the bright sunshine, the 
brave liveries, the beaming faces of the bride and her attend- 
ants ; the noble figure of Washington, his perfect horseman- 
ship, his ever recurring glance of mingled pride and affection 
as he sought in the midst of loveliness the soft eyes of her 
who was fairest and dearest to his heart. Love, a hundred 
and thirty years ago, was the love we know to-day. Amid all 
our revolutions it has remained the same, and a tale of love 
like that is ever fresh and charming, though the lovers have 
grown old, have died, and been buried for a hundred years. 

My fellow-citizens, the spirit of George Washington to-day 
is riding by the chariot of the nation, and in it he sees the 
faces of the States, as he saw the bride and the bridesmaids 
a hundred years ago. 

Will you pardon the State pride of a Virginian, responding 
to this toast, if my fancy puts back into his eyes that joyous 
light of the wedding festival, as he beholds his beloved 
Virginia, in her old place, once more surrounded by the 
dazzling galaxy of the sisterhood of States. [Applause.] 

And now, pursuing the simile, but descending from the 
sublime to the ridiculous, the rimning gear of that chariot 
reminded me of the parties of this country. In the front, with 
the king-pin of national union, springing from the axle, with 
the pole that gives direction to it, ever leading and pointing 
the course of destiny, is the great Republican party. Behind 
it, bearing the burdens of the States, and making a great ado 
in passing over ruts that the forewheels have already passed, 



representing the liind wheels of the veliicle, is the Democratic 
party, always content to go rumbling and noisy in a track 
already made, and neyer making a track of its own unless the 
thing is going backwards. [Laughter and applause.] 

But we must honestly admit the merits of the present 
administration when we see them. We must l)e just and even 
generous to our adversaries in the catholic spirit. It is the 
off 3'ear. You maj' have noticed that our tempers are always 
better in tlie off year. One merit we are Avilling to accord to 
the present administration; one act that made us feel that 
touch of nature which makes the Avhole Avorld kin. When 
Grover Cleveland, setting a good e.xamjjle to the other old 
bachelors of this land, led a lovely being to the White House, 
Republican and Democrat alike took off his hat and 

BOWED TO WOMxVNHOOD 

a sincere obeisance. Democrat and Republican alike yielded 
homage to the noble woman that he has chosen to dignify the 
position, [xlpplause.] 

This, I may truly say, is, as I believe, the only event which 
has occurred since his inauguration to excite one feeling of 
interest or sentiment among the people, or to relieve his 
administration in the slightest degree of its character of the 
veriest common-place, stolidity, negative inefficiency and 
disap})ointment. 

One other thought and I have done. The name of George 
Washington, the father of every principle we cherish, has ever 
been a household Avord with me. My father's mother's father, 
at nineteen years of age, left his bride of but six weeks and 
followed the fortunes of George Washington. He fought with 
the Ninth Virginia Regiment, under a red bandana handker- 
chief tied to a ramrod, at Brandywine. He staid with him and 
never returned to his home until my grandmother was eighteen 
months old. His name appears oftener as officer of the day, 
during that bleak and dreary winter at Valley Forge, than any 



18 

other officer upon the revohitioiiary roster. He entered the 
service as a Lieutenant and came back a Colonel ; and 
when the French war was threatened was appointed a Major- 
General of the Virginia Militia by George Washington him- 
self. To the day of his death, in ever}^ company he had but 
one toast, and that was "Clod l)less George Washington." [Ap- 
plause.] George Washington, in the househould where I was 
reared, Avas type and synonym of all that Avas noble in man- 
kind. I was taught that he was greater than Alexander, be- 
cause no tear of thirst for conquest ever coursed doAvn his 
cheek. I was taught that he was greater than Caesar, because 
he curbed his ambition. I Avas taught that he AA-as greater 
than Marlborough, because no sordid act eAer soiled his 
great life. I Avas taught that he AA'as greater than Napoleon, 
because he Avas content to fight for liis country AA-ithout con- 
verting his triumphs into a Avar of aggression. I Avas told 
that he Avas greater than all, l>ecause he combined statesman, 
soldier, and citizen as no man before him did or since he lived 
has done. [Applause.] My friend avIio preceded me has 
apostrophised that flag. Why should I not love it — the flag- 
that George Washington handed doAvn to us ? There never 
Avas a day, so help me God, that I ever felt that it belonged 
to anybod}^ else but me. [Tremendous cheers.] 

The day Avhen I acknoAvledged allegiance to another banner 
has gone and passed forever. The vision of another empire 
on this soil has passed aAvay as a baseless dream. The man 
Avho Avould revivify it is a dreamer and visionary. Nothing- 
short of the poAver that liade Lazarus arise and come forth 
in his grave clothes after he had been dead for days, could 
put life in that idea. I do not say that the struggle Avill be 
forgotten. No, it Avill not be forgotten. It Avas too gigantic, 
too fierce, too blood}', and the seams of its scars still disfigure 
our national countenance. It Avill be remembered. Yes, it 
Avill. Among the many monuments reared to the memory of 
George Washington is one splendid shaft at the National 



19 

Capital. It springs in simple sjmmetiy until it melts in the 
blue ether above, taller than any of its fellows. It tells the 

SIMPLE, GRAND STORY 

of the life of George Washington, and bears iipon its face 
au allegory more complete than is contained in all the 
hieroglyphics upon Cleopatra's needle. What is it ? From 
the ground upward to a certain point it bears a discolored 
surface. The stones are varied and lack homogeneity. 
Thence onward it springs unblemished to its completion. 
For a century to come that monument will bear that mark, 
aye, until it crumbles back to earth, perhaps, it will tell the 
story. What was it? Was it begun hy the universal con- 
cession, that George Washington's country and his principles 
should survive in their iinity ? No. It was begun witli 
woman's love. One stone at a time, rising slowly, that monu- 
ment to Washington rose, rose, rose laboriously and beset 
with doubt as to its completion, until at last when the great 
struggle came which was to decide whether those ]:)rinciples 
should be made per|>e.tual, it stopped. There it stood while 
the great struggle went on. Around its top were clouds and 
darkness. About it was a mist that hung, concealing its 
incompleteness. It stood like an interrogation mark, as if to 
say : Shall the principles of George Washington prevail in 
the land which he made free? But now again, with a neAV 
impulse, the building l)egan afresh. Homogeneous, bright, 
unspotted, thence it sprang onward and iipward until it was 
built, and the completed monument bears on its face time's 
legend, telling when it paused, how it toiled and then how it 
sprang until it was done. Future generations shall ask why 
the base of that monument is discolored, why its stones are 
variant, and why its summit is so white and pure like the 
snow clouds of the Alps ? They will ask who completed 
the monument to George Washington ; who made the story 
of his life C(>ni])lete? Wlio placed it there, tlie evidence that 



20 

those principles for -wliicli lie struggled sliull be the guiding 
faith of the people of this land ? i3e the Kepublican party 
dead or alive, be it banished forever from power or yet to 
come back stronger than ever — until that monument shall 
crumble, until it shall fall back to the earth from which it 
springs, it stands as 

A PEllPETUAL MEMOEIAL 

that the principles of George Washington were perpetuated 
by the Kepublican party of this countr}-. That it answered 
the question as to whether this country should survive as a 
unit, in a voice of thunder that made the nations tremble. 
[Applause. J 

And now, my fellow-citizens, good- night. I shall bear 
back with me to the Republicans of Virginia a cheering story 
of the good cheer, of the good spirits, of the hopefulness of 
Republicans that I have met here. Old Virginia and Michigan 
are ver}' nearly equal in their representation. Don't you fear 
that your eleven Representatives will have their votes killed 
by the Virginia delegation. [Applause.] We hope to send 
vou Republican delegates enough to help Detroit out of the 
temporary difificulty under which she labors at present. 
[Applause and laughter.] We hope to send you Republicans 
enough to help one or two other districts of this State, but 
be assured that Ave do not do it because we want to, and we 
rely upon you to send as many Republicans to Congress as 
old Virginia sends. That is one of the revolutions that you, 
perhaps, had not thought of. [Laughter and applause.] 
Now, my fellow-citizens, good-night. I wish I could stay 
with you longer [cries of ''go on"], but there are others here 
from Iowa, from the East— not from the North, for I believe 
we have got about as far North as the law allows [laughter], 
unless Ave are going over to take part in the election in 
Canada. 

Good-night. [Applause.] 



21 

At the conclusion, Senator Palmer proposed three cheers 
for old Virginia, which were given standing, and amid great 
enthusiasm and waving of hats, napkins and handkerchiefs,, 
while the band played " Dixie." 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



011 895 970 n f 



